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psychical 
Surgery 




JOSEPH RALPH 



_, „ II 



Psychical Surgery 

A BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF 

THE ANALYTICAL METHOD 

IN THE TREATMENT OF 

MENTAL AND PSYCHICAL 
DISTURBANCES 



< — > 



BY 



JOSEPH RALPH 






Copyright 1920 

BY 

Joseph Ralph 



*J U i -» 2 i iwcJ 



printed by 

Times-Mirror Printing & Binding House 

los angeles, california 



©HIA570597 



CONTENTS 

Page 

Preface 5 

Introduction 7 

Sublimating the Impulses ..... 15 

Mental Life of the Child 19 

The Unconscious Complexes .... 35 

The Neuroses 48 

Psychoanalysis 55 

Complexes and Dream Phenomena ... 65 

Conclusion 74 



PREFACE 

Just as the Rosetta Stone was the key by which 
the secrets of Egyptian hieroglyphics became revealed 
to western civilization, so have the Freudian principles 
of psychoanalysis opened the door to an understanding 
of the underlying causes for many of the mental and 
psychical disturbances that have hitherto been so little 
understood, and also to the means for curing them. 

In order to intelligently understand what psycho- 
analysis is, and thereby apprehend by what means un- 
desirable mental and psychical conditions can be reme- 
died through its application, it is necessary to under- 
stand the basic principles that govern unconscious men- 
tal life, and these the writer has endeavored to briefly 
describe. The list of books at the end is set forth in 
the interest of those who may desire to study the sub- 
ject in its refinements. 

Various so-called "modifications" of Freud's great 
principles are practiced by various people, with which 
the writer confesses scant sympathy. To quote Freud's 
own opinions in this connection such "modifications" 
are as counterparts of the famous knife of Lichten- 
berg ; the hilt is changed to a new blade, the old trade- 
mark retained, and the weapon then represented to 
be the famous original. 

Joseph Ralph. 

May, 192c, 



1 



INTRODUCTION 

The following is from Dr. William A. White's Out- 
lines of Psychiatry : 

"Genetic psychology gives the same value to mind 
that anatomy and physiology do to the body, and like 
them recognizes that present forms can only be ex- 
plained by the past. In other words the mind has a 
history just as the body has : it has its embryology and ; 

its comparative anatomy, and a study of the develop- 
ment of the mind in the individual, and its degree of 
development, likenesses and differences in different 
races throws the same sort of light upon psychological 
facts as does the study of embryology and comparative 
anatomy upon the facts of anatomy and physiology." 

In man's unconscious mental processes the archaic 
still survives ; in fact it constitutes the basis of human 
character. Charity and selfishness, humility and ego- 
tism, kindness and cruelty, self-abnegation and arro- 
gance, love and hatred, and all such characteristics of 
strength and frailty, spring from common ancestral 
roots. That which is good is a sublimation of what 
was previously crude ; that which is not good is a primi- 
tive strain that has not yet become refined. 

Beneath the veneer of civilization the savage in man 
still exists, and this becomes only too evident when the 



8 Psychical Surgery 

individual is subjected to unusual stress, for although 
under such conditions we see some people exhibiting 
the very best qualities they possess,, on the other hand 
we see others exhibiting the very worst. 

In times of great danger the sublimated race preserv- 
ative instinct is manifested in some individuals by deeds 
of service to others and in self sacrifice, but in other 
instances we see the impulses of the primitive savage 
breaking through the barriers of cultural restraint and, 
dominated in his unlovely brutality by the animal in- 
stinct of personal safety, trampling down women and 
children, the sick and the aged. In mob experiences, 
such as in lynchings. neither retribution nor justice 
exist as actuating impulses : the only dominating desire 
is that of rending. In times of flood and similar dis- 
aster, when social authority may be temporarily para- 
lyzed and the property rights of individuals are for 
the moment unguarded, we find that the first neces- 
sary protective measures on the part of the first 
re-established authority is that of shooting down with- 
out compunction the reincarnated troglodyte repre- 
sented in the person of the looter. For that matter 
the whole of society's penal code has been devised for 
the purpose of securing protection from the atavistic 
tendencies of its own members. 

In his Psychology of the Unconscious Jung says: 
"We know, although individuals are widely separated 



Introduction 9 

by the differences in the contents of their conscious- 
ness, they are closely alike in their unconscious psy- 
chology. It is a significant impression for one working 
in practical psychoanalysis when he realizes how uni- 
form are the typical unconscious complexes." When 
we speak of "human nature" in relation to some unde- 
sirability of character we are therefore uttering a psy- 
chological truism, for the core of human character 
consists of the strains of our ancestral heritage. We 
have only to dig sufficiently deep down into our per- 
sonalities for the savage to become revealed. 

If we apply the acid test to our individual selves we 
can discern in our daily actions the influences of our 
archaic past; they crop out everywhere and under all 

conditions. In characteristics that are sometimes 

» 

charitably called foibles or idiosyncrasies we can rec- 
ognize in ourselves primitive strains tinging our 
actions. The farther we are removed from cultural 
restraint the more pronouncedly evident our primitive 
strains become ; in our own homes we are therefore 
more primitive than when we are exposed to the social 
gaze, still more so in our conscious thoughts, and most 
of all in our unconscious selves. 

Every thought that comes up into the consciousness 
that we would be ashamed for the world to recognize 
is a cave-man heritage, and every undesirable action 
can be linked up with unsublimated archaic tendencies ; 



10 Psychical Surgery 

so whether we are selfish, egotistical, cruel and vain, 
or charitable, humble, kind and unaffected, depends 
wholly upon the nature and degree of moulding that 
our underlying ancestral strains have undergone. It 
will therefore be only too sadly obvious that,, although 
we have come a long, long way in our striving for a 
fullness of psychical expression, we still have a long, 
long way to go. 

According to the Freudian concept the human mind 
has three broad divisions: (a) the conscious, (b) the 
fore-conscious, and (c) the unconscious. 

The conscious part of the mind is that faculty that 
enables the personality to adapt itself to environment 
by intellectual thinking. The fore-conscious is where 
memories are stored that have been more or less intel- 
lectually appreciated, and which can be recalled to 
consciousness (to a greater or lesser extent), by an 
effort of will (recollection). The unconscious is where 
memories are stored that are neither apprehended nor 
controlled by the consciousness. 

The student of psychoanalysis should accustom him- 
self to considering the terms the fore-conscious and 
the unconscious as substantives and not as adjectives, 
for these terms do not imply mental conditions but 
mental divisions, though these are not necessarily 
sharply defined. 

A well balanced personality is one that is capable of 



Introduction 11 

estimating at a proper value every condition that it 
may be confronted with, and reacts thereto in a manner 
directly proportional to the requirement. Thus, for 
example, small things should never annoy us and big 
ones should always be apprehended according to their 
exact values. Unfortunately, however, perfectly well 
balanced personalities are not the general rule for most 
of us have temperamental weaknesses. 

In a psychiatrical sense the most complete mental 
life is that which permits the widest range of adjust- 
ment in order to cope with the requirements of environ- 
ment, and conversely a mental life that permits only 
of a limited adjustment is a relatively incomplete one. 
The one is flexible within a wide range of adaptability, 
while the other is lacking in this respect. 

In spite of the best available cultural training, even 
when supplemented by strong religious influences, and 
with the individual personally aspiring to a betterment 
of conditions, we often witness the phenomena of un- 
desirable impulses breaking through the barriers of 
cultural restraint with more or less painful and disas- 
trous consequences. It is a common experience, in 
fact, for an individual to be highly circumspect in his 
relation to the requirements of his general environment 
and yet in some particular instance to betray a psy- 
chical "flaw." Then again we often witness minds 
that seem to function more or less normally under com- 



12 Psychical Surgery 

monplace conditions, but which seem to "fly off" when 
the conditions become in any way stressful. It is in 
relation to such instances as these that psychoanalysis 
has a special interest. 

It is impossible to proceed very far in a considera- 
tion of mental phenomena without being confronted 
with their relationship to the sexual life. In fact it is 
now an accepted psychiatrical truism that the sexual 
and mental activities are so closely interrelated that any 
aberration in the latter (except where the physical pro- 
cesses of the brain are involved), presupposes some 
form of aberration in the former, a condition which is 
invariably shown by analysis to result from a lack of 
sublimation of the sexual impulse where cultural re* 
quirements have restricted its physical expression. 

It is very necessary that the term sublimation be 
thoroughly understood in its psychoanalytical sense, 
otherwise there can be no rightful apprehension of the 
basic principle of Freud's theory of the neuroses and 
of mental disturbances in general. This principle pre- 
dicates that sexual sensations are physical expressions 
of an underlying psychical quality that constitutes the 
primal race-preservative instinct, and that this instinct 
can by the requisite mental training be used in a wholly 
psychical manner. In his Psychoanalytical Method 
Dr. Oskar Pfister defines this process of sublimation 
as "Turning the life force from primary functions 



Introduction 13 

chiefly to such higher activities as realize these func- 
tions symbolically." The exact meaning of all of which 
is that it is possible for the physical attributes of the 
sexual impulse to become so thoroughly absorbed by 
ethical and religious aspirations and efforts as to lose 
their physical insistence: the impulse finds an expres- 
sion and satisfaction in a sublimated manner and form. 
In this connection a great truth that psychoanalysis 
has demonstrated is that, no matter whether the sexual 
impulse eventually finds its expression in a physical 
way, or becomes wholly sublimated into ethical and 
religious activities, the course of its development must 
not be interfered with ; it must fully mature. Further- 
more, when sexual maturity has been attained the im- 
pulse must be used, and if it cannot be used in a phy- 
sical manner it must have an opportunity to become 
expressed in a sublimated form. If an expression is 
not attained through either one of these two courses 
then the general psychic life is liable to experience very 
grave disturbances. 



Race Preservative & 

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Illustrating the development of a well balanced personality from the 
Race-preservative and self-preservative p»iin nr rli«t instincts. 



Sublimating the Impulses 15 



SUBLIMATING THE IMPULSES 

The initial point of the personality is the self-race 
impulse, from which there emerges the first "split" in 
the form of the race-preservative and the self-preserv* / 
ative instincts. It is here, at the very lowest point of 
human life, that we find the initial instance of mental 
conflict, for the very attributes of these two instincts 
imply counter reaction impulses. The one conduces to 
self, while the other is for others. The one implies to 
keep, while the other signifies to give away. 

A well balanced personality is one in which the emo- 
tions and the intellect form a fitting complement to 
each other, and where neither improperly preponder- 
ates. If the development of the personality is wholly 
intellectual the result is a glorified form of an intel- 
lectual cold-storage chamber ; on the other hand if the 
emotional side is not. fittingly compensated by a desir- 
able mental development it is quite possible that some 
form of mental incompetence will materialize. 

The lines along which the personality should develop 
are illustrated in the accompanying diagram. Starting 
from the race-preservative and self-preservative im- 
pulse the sexual life opens out as a well defined quality 
that possesses a primary tendency to seek a purely 



16 Psychical Surgery 

physical expression, but the sublimating of which pri- 
mary tendency is necessary if social betterment is to 
be attained through the influences of religion, culture 
and altruism. Concomitantly with this spiritual devel- 
opment the mental life must receive its opportunity 
also, and by means of educative measures become intel- 
lectually developed. A well developed personality 
therefore presupposes a well developed spiritual life 
and a well developed mental life. 

In the personality diagram a cross will be seen on 
the sublimation line of the race-preservative side, the 
position and significance of which should be noted, for 
it is at that point where modern society breeds its 
great army of psychical weaklings : the insane, the 
perverse, the neurotics and hysterics. No matter how 
much farther along the race-preservative line in the 
personality's development the actual outbreak or break- 
down may occur, nor what particular influences are 
given as reasons for such outbreak or breakdown, the 
cause of the trouble can invariably be traced to experi- 
ences undergone at the stage or period of life indicated 
by the cross in the diagram. (Physical influences are, 
of course, excepted from this generalization). 

A primitive impulse must either be given an oppor- 
tunity to express itself according to its intuitive inclina- 
tions or else be sublimated to a condition where its 
initial energy can be utilized in some other direction. 



Sublimating the Impulses 17 

But an impulse energy cannot be killed unless the 
mechanism to which it pertains is also killed, and the 
point of the cross on the sublimation line of the per- 
sonality chart indicates where a wholly unnatural 
condition is oftentimes developed by reason of the 
sexual impulse being suppressed instead of being sub- 
limated, and which psychical attitude leads eventuall}> 
to sure and certain disaster. 

Insanity, neurosis and hysteria, are mental and ner- 
vous diseases pertaining to civilization but, contrary 
to general understanding, neither mental stress nor 
environmental complexities have anything whatever 
to do with the inception of such disorders. The causes 
of these derangements can nearly always be traced to 
undesirable experiences in the mental and psychical 
life of the individual in which the energy of the sexual 
impulse has neither had an opportunity for natural 
physical expression nor been sublimated into psychical 
channels. 

The sublimation of the sexual impulse means a pro- 
cess by which, although there is a full development of 
the sexual ability, the mind is so healthily occupied in 
persistent efforts in the pursuit of high ideals that the 
energy of the impulse is psychically absorbed; there is 
therefore nothing ''dammed back" and the energy of 
the race-preservative impulse is utilized by a desirable 
form of mental activity; and as the best absorbing 



18 Psychical Surgery 

trend of mental activity is always in the direction 
where high ideals are concerned it necessarily follows 
that sublimating aims are most easily and most strongly 
visualized in the direction of religion, culture and altru- 
ism. All of which is not only very beautiful but is 
also very true. In its ultimate analysis, in fact, the 
race preservative instinct finds its culminating expres- 
sions in the highest forms of self-sacrifice. Whether, 
therefore, this instinct becomes the guiding principle 
of desirable actions or the blighting curse of psychical 
abnormalities depends entirely upon the sublimating 
influences that have been brought to bear on it. 



Mental Life of the Child 19 



MENTAL LIFE OF THE CHILD 

The nature of the training bestowed upon the per- 
sonality during the years immediately succeeding ado- 
lescence will greatly influence the general character, 
but the underlying tendencies of that character are 
largely determined by the influences the child is sub- 
jected to during the pre-adolescent years of its life. 
The adolescent time may be a critical one in the life 
of the child, but the pre-adolescent years are far more 
so ; in fact if the mental and psychical development of 
the child has been governed by wholly desirable influ- 
ences during the impressionable years that stretch from 
the cradle to adolescence, the adolescent time proper 
need give little cause for concern. 

An understanding of characterstics in the mental 
life of the adult necessitates an understanding of the 
conditions under which the mental life of the child 
develops, for it is during the child's early mental life 
that many of the characteristics of the adult person- 
ality are created. 

No greater mistake has ever been made in connec- 
tion with the early life of the child than the assump- 
tion that it does not experience any sexual sensations 
until there is a centralization of the sexual qualities 



20 Psychical Surgery 

in the genital regions; for the sexual life of the child 
really commences with its birth, just as its mental life 
does. Furthermore, actual sexual reactions in the 
child are observable almost from its first hour of exist- 
ence, though the mother or nurse oftentimes fail to 
note the significance of the evidences in this connec- 
tion. 

When the mother or nurse soothes a restless infant 
by gently stroking its back or abdomen the "soothing" 
effect is accomplished by producing a pleasurable phy- 
sical sensation, and the exact nature of which pleasur- 
able physical sensation is identical in form with sexual 
gratification as experienced in adult life ; the only dif- 
ference is that of degree. In the adult experience the 
pleasurable physical sensations connected with sexual 
gratification attain a definite climax at a particular 
focal point, e. g., the genitals, whereas in the case of 
the child there is neither climax nor focal point in the 
sexual excitement, for at this time the sexual qualities 
exist in the child's physical mechanism in a state of 
diffusion, and consequently the sensations it experiences 
are also of a diffused character; they are vague and 
indefinable, but nevertheless their true characteristics 
are unmistakable. 

No matter at what early period we consider the 
child's mental life (even if such a study commences 
practically at birth), we do not conclude that it has 



Mental Lm of th£ Child 21 

no mind because it is unable to comprehend what is 
said to jit, or because it is unable to express itself in 
words to us; such a view would be a suggestion that 
the child is a congenital idiot; it is known, however, 
that every movement of the eyes and clutching of 
fingers on the part of the infant indicates the rudi- 
mentary processes of mental activity. It is also obvious 
(at least to the psychoanalyst), that the signs of "com- 
fort" or of being ''soothed" when the hand of mother 
or nurse gently stimulates the peripheral terminals of 
sundry nerve processes are sure indications that phy- 
sical pleasure is being experienced, and that this phy- 
sical pleasure can only be of one possible nature. Thus 
the first lesson to be learned in connection with an 
understanding of the psychic life of the child is the fact 
that sexual unfoldment commences at birth. 

From this stage of sexual diffusion the child's life 
develops into what is known as the auto-erotic period. 
This is a stage in its life when a degree of mental 
consciousness has become sufficiently developed to 
enable it to take an interest in things, which interest 
strongly centers around those parts of its body that 
have to do with the requirements of its physical needs. 
This mental attitude is known as erogenous interest, 
and the parts of the body in which this interest strongly 
centers are known as erogenous zones. 

In the first stage of life the sexual qualities are 



22 Psychical Surgery 

diffused, and the sexual reactions to such experiences 
as the nerve excitation from a stroking by the mother's 
hand are therefore unconscious; but in the auto-erotic 
period the child's mind has developed sufficiently for 
it to mentally associate certain actions with certain 
reactions ; it has learned to think to at least some 
extent : in other words, the child has developed out of 
the totally passive stage of sexual development and 
has entered upon the first experience of positive ac- 
tion ; it has already effected a mental connection be- 
tween the excitation of its erogenous zones and the 
resultant pleasurable physical sensations. 

As this erogenous interest manifests itself at a period 
when both the mental and sexual processes are ex- 
tremely susceptible to external influences it will be 
seen that the auto-erotic stage of the child's life is 
extremely critical, and it is at this early time in the 
child's mental and psychical development that the seeds 
are unfortunately sown for many of the undesirable 
psycho-sexual characteristics that are met with only 
too frequently in adult life. 

In the unfolding of the child's mind a psychical atti- 
tude becomes expressed which it is very necessary to 
note though it is extremely hard to describe and still 
harder to define, but which may be designated as the 
life hunger, or the hunger to live. This indefinable 
quality is the germ of the individual psychical life and 



Mental Life of the Child 23 

expresses itself as an instinctive desire to "reach out" 
in order to get into touch with conditions that are 
beyond the immediate need, and acts as the urge of life. 
This urge is the sum total of the ancestral memories 
acting as an evolutionary instinct, and in a religious 
sense can be quite appropriately called the spirit that 
is within man. In psycho-analytical practice the term 
libido is often used to express or designate this instinc- 
tive desire, but in the writer's opinion the simple term 
urge is quite as distinctive and even more expressive. 

As the urge is the evolutionary instinct in the indi- 
vidual it never rests, and is forever "reaching out" 
from the known to the unknown, from the assured to 
the indefinite. In the child we see evidences of the 
life urge manifesting as a desire to taste and touch 
anything and everything that is within reach, while in 
the adult we can identify this same element operating 
as an insatiable desire for betterment. It is this urge 
that serves as "antennae" to the personality in a cease- 
less groping outward from the present towards the 
future as if expressing an immutable incentive to push 
on. It constitutes the foundations of the personality, 
to which it brings lessons garnered from a long his- 
torical experience for the personality to profit by. 

When the child passes from the auto-erotic stage 
into the succeeding step of development of curiosity 
hunger the underlying life urge can be recognized in 



24 Psychical Surgery 

a manifesting of a most persistent desire to fathom 
all particulars of environmental conditions, and to 
surmount any form of barrier that serves to confine it ; 
nothing is taken for granted, neither does anything 
satisfy. In all its forms of activity the urge clearly 
reveals the fact that it is an insistent natural force 
forever working in the direction of a goal that has not 
yet been attained. 

In its struggle for satisfying its curiosity the urge 
of the archaic comes directly into contact with the re- 
quirements of social culture, and the characteristics 
of the eventually developed personality will depend 
upon the outcome of this contact. If the influences 
that are exerted on the life urge are wholly good the 
developed personality will be a desirable one and 
vice versa. It should be remembered, however, that 
the natural aim of the urge is that of attaining to an 
individual expression, and that this is only possible by 
development from within outwards ; hence no desir- 
able individuality can be built up on admonitions, for 
such a product would not in reality be an individuality 
but simply a composite outcome. Characteristics must 
not be "grafted on" to the developing personality, but 
should be cultivated. 

It can readily be understood that the child is liable 
to be influenced very strongly by the characteristics 
of those with whom it is most closely associated, and 



Mental Life of the Child 25 

that the characteristics and temperamental traits of the 
parents are therefore very important influences; but 
these characteristics and temperamental traits — how- 
ever important they may be to their owners — are pos- 
sibly of still more importance to the child on account 
of the reactions to which they may conduce in its 
psychic life; in this connection, however, it is neces- 
sary to understand the possibilities of what are known 
as ambivalent reactions. 

It is a commonplace that the idea lying closest to 
another idea is an opposite, such as hot-cold, long- 
short, light-dark, love-hate, kind-cruel, pain-pleasure, 
etc., which "pairing" of ideas Bleuler of Zurich calls 
"the two contrary feeling tones of one idea, or the two 
opposed emotional aspects or tendencies of one idea" 
and to which he applied the term ambivalency. It is 
by reason of this ambivalent tendency that we have 
the experience of rinding that the nearest idea in asso- 
ciation to the one that is occupying the consciousness 
is not one that is similar but one that is directly dis- 
similar. This same principle exists in relation to the 
emotions and the underlying psychic life that manifests 
as impulses ; hence we find that the attitudes of joy 
and grief, optimism and depression, love and hatred, 
are paired in their emotional tendencies, so that only 
too often it is but a step from one extreme to the 
other; and in the underlying impulses we find attrac- 



26 Psychical Surgery 

tion and repulsion, courage and fear, desire and aver- 
sion existing similarly in ambivalent association. It 
may in fact be stated as a cardinal principle of mental 
and psychical life that the natural reaction from an 
existing condition always produces a condition of an 
exactly opposite nature. 

This principle of ambivalent reaction is an extremely 
serious factor in the psychic life of the child, and one 
to the operation of which an almost illimitable train of 
mental and psychical disturbances and abnormalities 
are traceable. So extremely serious are the possibili- 
ties in this direction that some such admonition as 
Beware of Ambivalent Reactions would make a fitting 
motto for the wall of every home where child life is 
unfolding. An illustration will perhaps help to make 
my meaning quite clear. L,et us suppose that the child 
has been caught indulging in some little "animalistic" 
action or other (say in relation to some of its bodily 
functions, or perhaps in the form of sexual curiosity 
in regards to itself or someone else), which behavior is 
simply the result of a natural tendency at a certain 
period in the child's life : further, let us assume that, 
instead of being gently admonished so that the child's 
attention (its urge), becomes carefully turned away 
from an undesirable to a desirable direction, a psy- 
chical shock is produced in the child through an unduly 
harsh or threatening attitude or treatment on the part 



Mental Life of the Child 27 

of the mother or other guardian. Under these circum- 
stances the probabilities are that inj most cases a reac- 
tion will occur which will take the form of the ambiv- 
alent complement of the previously existing interest. 
Hence, as the child's mental attitude just prior to the 
psychical shock was one of intense interest, in which 
there was undisguised pleasure, the ambivalent reac- 
tion in the child's tender susceptibilities would prob- 
ably take the form of deep aversion and intense pain, 
aversion and pain being, as we have seen, the ambiv- 
alent complements of interest and pleasure. The effect 
on the child in such an instance might therefore take 
the form of an extreme and unexplainable aversion to 
anything and everything that has any memory asso- 
ciation whatever with conditions it was previously so 
much interested in. In its effort to "sense" its environ- 
ment the urge in the child's psychic life has suffered 
a severe wound, a repetition of which it naturally 
seeks to avoid by retiring from the danger zone as far 
as possible : thus we can see that the reaction of going 
from extreme interest to extreme aversion and from 
extreme pleasure to extreme shame is a manifestation 
on the part of the Urge impulse to profit by its experi- 
ence and is also a defense against the dangers of fur- 
ther similar exposures. 

It is of vital interest to the matured personality that 
the child should not suffer any psychical shocks during 



28 Psychical Surgery 

its extremely impressionable early years, and every 
indication of interest or action in undesirable directions 
should be treated gently (for such tendencies are nat- 
ural and to be expected), and the interest towards un- 
desirable things carefully deflected towards those that 
are desirable. Under this careful treatment the urge 
instinct will let go of the old and take hold of the new 
without any realization of undesirable experiences. It 
has had its development in the direction of cultural 
requirements aided and without being shocked. 

The origin of many of the unreasoning fears that 
are experienced by many people remained a mystery 
until solved by psychoanalysis, and only by these 
methods have the true causes of many of such undesir- 
able mental tendencies been revealed. We know now 
that aversion is the ambivalent compliment of pleasur- 
able interest and we also know that if we follow an 
analysis of aversion to its ultimate we find that it is 
fear. Reduced to its elementary qualities we also find 
that shame is in reality fear ; in fact by psychoanalysis 
it has been determined that fear constitutes the exact 
basis of many hitherto seemingly different qualities. 
Furthermore, it is now known that fears are devel- 
oped from within the individual and constitute extreme 
reactions from mental attitudes that were formerly of 
an exactly opposite character. Fears all arise from 
wounds that the life urge has experienced in its hunger 



Mental Life of the Child 29 

struggle to better its environment, and invariably result 
from injudicious actions on the part of parents, guar- 
dians or teachers. 

After the curiosity stage the child's life merges into 
that of simulation. This is a period in the mental life 
of the child when the mind has become sufficiently 
developed to note the deportment and behavior of other 
individuals and it endeavors to copy their actions to a 
greater or lesser extent, especially the actions of those 
who are much older. The child will have outgrown 
the little atavistic tendencies that it manifested in its 
auto-erotic and curiosity stages of development and is 
now reaching out towards new forms of experiences; 
it is beginning to consider itself as a self-governing 
unit containing the means to adapt itself to its own 
environment to a certain extent. The child's mental 
horizon has now become broadened, but its responsi- 
bilities have also become increased. 

One of the startling discoveries made by psychoan- 
alytical methods is the fact that infantile concepts can 
be carried into adult life, and when this occurs (and it 
is a very frequent occurrence), the adult personality 
may be described as having "dents," i. e., portions of 
the personality have never become properly rounded 
out ; the individual in some respects has never grown 
up. Conditions such as these are known as infantile 
fixations and are often caused by the life urge of the 



30 Psychical Surgery 

child being unduly influenced by some set of persistent 
experiences which, by deflecting the urge from the 
normal tendency to "reach out" cause it instead to 
become fixed, or (as it is sometimes called in psychoan- 
alytical phrase) "anchored." 

It is during the simulation period of the child's 
life that the foundations are laid for many of the 
temperamental characteristics of adult life, many of 
which are the results of infantile anchorages arising 
either from an undue attachment to a parent or an 
1 undue reaction from one. The range of undesirable 
results that can arise from fixations is practically illim- 
itable, but four broad possibilities may be considered, 
each one of which constitutes a type: (1) The urge 
of the child can be unduly attached to the mother, or 
(2) it can be unduly attached to the father, or there 
can be (3) an undue reaction from the mother, or (4) 
an undue reaction from the father. In each of those 
four broad types the fixation of concept may be of a 
purely mental nature or be associated with the sexual 
life also. If the fixation is purely mental the result 
will be indicated in temperamental qualities, whereas 
if the sexual life is involved the consequences may 
take some of the many forms of well known perver- 
sities. 

Two of the commonest forms of temperamental 
qualities resulting from infantile fixation are an undue 



Mental Liee oe the Child 31 

tendency to shirk responsibility and to be dependent 
upon the leadership of other people on the one hand, 
and on the other, an intolerable hostility towards any 
form of restraint. The first type generally results from 
too great a solicitude on the part of a parent (gener- 
ally the mother), by which the urge of the child be- 
comes unnaturally moulded to a certain concept as to 
its environment. In the other case the urge has become 
subjected to an unjust repression from a parent (usu- 
ally the father), which results in violent reactions. 

In the adult life the undue attachment form of fix- 
ation becomes manifested in a disinclination on the 
part of the urge to assume the burdens of life by 
aggressive action, and in continually seeking the "back- 
waters" of the social swirl : it also sometimes exhibits 
itself in the attempt to find its complement of satis- 
faction in pursuits in which the more virile take little 
interest. Where, on the other hand, there has been 
a reaction from undue harshness, the adult character- 
istics take the form of unruliness and intractibility 
and intolerance to all forms of restraint. Most of the 
mental belligerants that are met with in society belong 
to this type, hence it will be seen that many of the 
so-called "dominant" characters are in reality very 
infantile ones. 

The motive of the life urge is that of adaptability to 
environment, to get into touch with the unknown by 



32 Psychical Suroery 

reason of its knowledge of the known; its activities 
should therefore always be progressive. Where there 
is an anchorage to a mother-concept all progression 
ceases as far as that particular concept is concerned, 
and although the individual may live out his allotted 
three score and ten years he goes to the grave an infant 
so far as his mental growth has been arrested by 
anchorages. On the other hand, where there is a vio- 
lent reaction from a harsh and restraining parental 
influence the resulting belligerant characteristic in the 
adult life is in reality a life time protest on the part of 
the urge against experiences undergone during the 
infant life. In such cases it will be seen that people 
who are thus affected never attain to truly individual 
lives, but are governed throughout their whole exist- 
ence by undesirable parental influences, and thus go 
to the grave ruled by the characteristics of prede- 
cessors. 

It must not be forgotten that the terms fixation and 
anchorage imply unconscious mental conditions, and 
the personality thus affected has no conscious knowl- 
edge of the existence of these conditions. Such a per- 
son naturally thinks that the temperament, moods and 
passions that he displays are what he has developed 
within himself irrespective of extraneous influences, 
whereas these qualities are oftentimes positive "graft- 
ings" from the personalities of other people, and usu- 



Mental Life of the Child 33 

ally of an undesirable nature. Our desirable charac- 
teristics have probably entailed some very severe con- 
scious efforts but our undesirable ones are of an uncon- 
scious origin and we are not only consciously ignorant 
of their causes but do not even have any conscious 
apprehension of their existence often-times, for Nature 
seems to blind our eyes to our own imperfections. 

If a fixation occurs in relation to a concept involv- 
ing any aspects of the sexual functions the foundations 
are therein laid for the development of some form of 
the many strange sexual aberrations that are only too 
prevalent, the causes of which were not even intelli- 
gently conjectured until revealed by psychoanalytical 
methods. The psychcpathology of sexual aberration is 
a very sorrowful study and is one that lies beyond the 
province of this little book; it may be said, however, 
that the possible combinations and phases of undesir- 
able sexual tendencies that can result from some forms 
of disturbances in the early life of the child are very 
great indeed, and may range in importance from those 
that are vague in quality and indistinct in character up 
to those that constitute serious menaces to cultural 
requirements. 

From this brief sketch of the mental life of the child 
it will be seen that the development of the mental and 
sexual processes is exposed to great possibilities for 
evil, and that lasting injury to the mental characteris- 



34 Psychical Surgery 

tics and psychic life of the adult personality can only 
be avoided by an intelligent recognition of these 
dangers on the part of parents and guardians, coupled 
with an adoption of the necessary means for avoiding 
them. It will also be seen that in order to form any 
broad conception of the conditions that constitute adult 
mental life., together of the causes for deviation from 
normality of actions, it is necessary to follow the 
etiological trail clear back to the cradle. 

In electrical science the term "stepping up" is used 
to describe the process of transforming a low voltage 
into a higher voltage, and in releasing infantile fixa- 
tions and primitive concepts by psychoanalysis the aim 
is also that of stepping up: a stepping up of the per- 
sonality from infantile tendencies to the higher stand- 
ards required by the adult life. The patient is helped 
to grow up. 



The Unconscious Complexes 35 



THE UNCONSCIOUS COMPLEXES 

Whether a personality is well balanced in tempera- 
ment, rational in conduct, and unprejudiced in opin- 
ions, or badly balanced in temperament, irrational in 
conduct, and prejudiced in opinions, depends wholly 
on the extent and nature in the unconscious mental 
mechanism of what are known as complexes. It is 
therefore very important that people should know what 
unconscious complexes are, how they are formed, and 
by what means they influence the conscious actions. 

A complex is a constellation of ideas in the uncon- 
scious that has become grouped around the memory 
of some painful experience that has been repressed 
by the consciousness. Under some condition or other 
an experience has been undergone by the individual 
that has resulted in great pain, such as in the form 
of shame, remorse or aversion, etc., and which experi- 
ence there is a strong desire to forget. The experience 
has been so extremely undesirable and painful that the 
personality desires to even disavow to itself that the 
unpleasant incident has actually taken place, and desires 
to completely banish all remembrance of it from the 
consciousness. The effort to thus banish the offending 
memory is often very successful as far as the conscious- 
ness is concerned, but at a cost to the personality that 



Y 



36 Psychical Surgery 

is very great. The offensive memory may have become 
forced out of the consciousness, it is true, but it still 
survives in the unconscious and also still continues to 
exert an undesirable influence and in a way of which 
the consciousness has no knowledge. 

If the undesirable memory had been frankly faced 
by the consciousness, and the attention turned health- 
ily to the freshly materializing experiences of an active 
daily life, the painful effects of the undesirable memory 
would be gradually modified by the continual inrush- 
ing of new associations, and eventually the painful 
thoughts would become a part of the general synthesis 
of the mental life and thereby lose their individual in- 
sistent qualities : the undesirable influences of the pain- 
ful memory would by these means become dispersed. 
It is by such dispersing methods as these that the most 
poignant of griefs become assuaged in the course of 
time, because a continual inrush of new experiences 
in the daily life modifies and transforms the previously 
existing undesirable psychical attitudes. 

If an undesirable memory is not neutralized by being 
assimilated into the memories of new experiences, but 
is forced out of the consciousness, it sinks to the uncon- 
scious level of the mental mechanism and although 
completely obliterated from further conscious recog- 
nition it still retains its vitality and continues to exert 
it and in a most disastrous manner ; for instead of the 



Thd Unconscious Complexes 37 

painful memory being exposed to modifications by asso- 
ciating with newly materializing experiences from the 
exterior world, it not only retains its undesirable innate 
characteristics but also manifests a persistent tendency 
to become associated with all other memories that pos- 
sess sympathetic qualities. It is by such processes as 
these that undesirable memory constellations become 
formed in the unconscious. 

Repressed memory constellations (complexes) exert 
influences upon the conscious actions in a manner sim- 
ilar to that in which hereditary impulses influence 
them, for in neither case is there any conscious recog- 
nition of the influences that are being exerted because 
there are no intellectual connections between an im- 
pulse and a conscious action. 

The only distinguishing difference between an 
hereditary impulse and an acquired one (for a complex 
is in reality an acquired impulse), is that an hereditary 
impulse represents the sum of the ancestral memories 
of the race, whereas the acquired impulse revolves 
around some one particular memory of an incident 
in the individual's own experience. 

The impulse activity of a complex takes the form 
of violently reactioning from any influence that is 
associated in any way with the conditions that caused 
the repression in the first instance ; hence, anything 
seen, felt, heard, or thought of by the consciousness 



38 Psychical Surgery 

that has any memory associations whatever with the 
set of conditions under which the original painful 
experience occurred, produces a mental or psychical 
disturbance. Under such conditions the consciousness 
is so influenced by the underlying unconscious complex 
that it lives over again the original painful experience 
either in the form of a mental attitude or an emotional 
disturbance. 

Many of the well known phobias (unaccountable 
fears and aversions) such as agoraphobia (fear of open 
spaces) and claustrophobia (fear of confined spaces) 
etc., afford illustrations of influences upon the con- 
sciousness exerted by complexes that result from pain- 
ful memories. In such cases there is nothing in the 
open or confined spaces themselves to justify any 
mental or emotional disturbance ; but in some way or 
other such conditions as these revive unconscious 
memory associations in relation to something painful 
that has occurred in the individual's life and which has 
been repressed from the consciousness. The mental 
or emotional disturbance that is experienced in such 
cases is a psychical pain resulting from the irritation 
of an old mental wound. 

A primitive impulse is an intuitive inclination to 
react to environmental influences according to an in- 
stinct based upon memories of previous experiences, 
and is an unconscious mental process whereby the per- 



The Unconscious Complexes 39 

sonality profits by the accumulated experiences of the 
race in relation to environmental requirements ; and 
acquired impulses (in the form of complexes), act in 
a precisely similar manner. For instance, in the phobia 
illustrations : the psychical pain experienced by the 
consciousness through an arousal of a painful uncon- 
scious memory is intended by the unconscious mental 
mechanism to serve as a warning to the consciousness 
of the presence of danger, and as an intimation that 
the particular conditions now being experienced (by 
being seen, felt, heard or thought of), are similar in 
character to those that caused so much pain upon a 
previous occasion. For there are no intellectual pro- 
cesses available to the unconscious whereby it can 
understand that the existing conditions from which it 
is reacting do not contain anything that is painful per 
se; its "sense" is restricted to the mechanical gener- 
ation of a form of mental or emotional disturbance 
whenever it is exposed to an excitation by a set of 
conditions in any way analagous to those that created 
the painful memory in the first place. 

It must not be assumed that the formation of uncon- 
scious complexes is an unusual occurrence or that they 
are produced only by unusual experiences, for the 
reverse is the case. For that matter the whole of the 
unconscious mental mechanism is governed solely by 
intuitive processes in which no form of intellectual 



v^ 



40 Psychical Surgery 

functioning takes part. The unconscious is that part of 
the mind where all memories that sink into it become 
converted into a mechanical impulsiveness, the innate 
intuitive inclination of which is to react automatically 
(i. e., as an impulse), whenever it is subjected to stim- 
ulations by conditions that are similar to those that 
created the original memory in the first place. All 
memories that cannot be recalled to the consciousness 
by the voluntary attention (thinking) become naturally 
inclined to make their existence and nature manifest in 
the form of an impulse ; hence it follows that our whole 
unconscious mental life is one vast ramification of 
memory constellations functioning as acquired or sec- 
ondary impulses, and is the plane where the individ- 
ual's own acquired impulses become linked up with 
those that constitute the primitive impulses of the race : 
it is a place where the present becomes associated 
with the archaic past. 

We are prone to speak of our voluntary thoughts, 
the assumption being that we can create thoughts by 
our conscious efforts, but a little reflection will suffice 
to show that a voluntary thought is an impossibility. 
When we are thinking we concentrate our conscious 
attention upon a specific idea and then "sort out" the 
thoughts that come up into the consciousness from the 
fore-conscious in response to the "stirring up" the con- 
centrated attention has accomplished. We create 



The Unconscious Complexes 41 

nothing whatever by thinking, but simply consciously 
utilize something that we have previously garnered 
into the mind as a result of observation, experience 
and reflection. 

The process of intellectual thinking consists in (a) 
directing the attention towards an idea, and (b) esti- 
mating, discriminating, and utilizing or rejecting the 
thoughts that come up into the consciousness ; and the 
nature and value of the thoughts that come up into the 
consciousness and become available to it will then 
depend upon the following two major considerations : 
(a) the nature and value of the thought memories 
that are stored in the fore-conscious, and (b) the avail- 
ability of the stored memories to the consciousness 
without exposure to unconscious censorship. 

As regards the nature and value of the thought 
memories that are available to the consciousness under 
ideal conditions, the conception held by Locke is as 
true today as when formulated in 1690, viz. that noth- 
ing can come forth from the mind but what has, in 
some form or other, previously entered therein ; to 
which conception Freud's researches into the psycho- 
pathology of everyday life has given additional inter- 
est; for we now know that the thoughts that come 
up into the consciousness as a result of the directed 
attention do not reflect the impartial qualities of the 
underlying memories but are of a biased character, and 



42 Psychical Surgery 

are thus biased because they have been subjected to a 
censorship by the underlying complexes. 

It will be remembered that our whole unconscious 
mental life is a mechanism whereby memories of en- 
vironmental experiences become endowed with impulse 
activities, the functions of which activities take the 
form of reactioning intuitively whenever conditions are 
experienced in the conscious life that are similar to 
those that produced the memories in the first instance. 
It is by this great principle of Nature that the con- 
sciousness is able to benefit from its vast range of en- 
vironmental experiences without carrying the cumula- 
tive burden of the multitude of memories that are con- 
nected with such experiences. But this intuitive 
response on the part of the unconscious mental mechan- 
ism does not by any means absolve the consciousness 
of its responsibility for accepting or rejecting the im- 
pulse as a motive of action. 

When an acquired impulse (unconscious complex) 
responds to an excitation from some experience that 
has aroused an old unpleasant memory, the effect on 
the consciousness takes the form of a mental or emo- 
tional disturbance, the nature and degree of which will 
depend upon the seriousness of the original (repressed) 
memory. Many of the strange slips of speech, the 
sudden losing of one's subject in conversation, the 
forgetfulness of names, places and incidents that are 



The; Unconscious Complexes 43 

really familiar, etc., etc., are nearly all the results 
of "psychical barriers" that have been raised by the 
unconscious mental mechanism against a threatened 
revival of some memory that would be painful if 
recalled. 

From what has been said it will be seen that the 
unconscious mental mechanism transmutes many of 
the memories of conscious experiences into intuitive 
functions, thereby enabling the personality to profit 
from experiences in a great many cases without utiliz- 
ing conscious discrimination, i e., by "sensing" a con- 
dition "intuitively." But it will also be noted that 
although the intuitive impulses (complexes) constitute 
one of Nature's great aids to the personality whereby 
it is enabled to profit by experience in many ways in 
a semi-mechanical manner, yet these intuitive impulses 
are not necessarily reliable guides for the conscious- 
ness to follow : in many instances, indeed, they are dis- 
tinctly the reverse of reliable. It is extremely neces- 
sary, therefore, that the unconscious mental mechanism 
is utilized by the consciousness as a servant, and that 
this servant is never permitted to assume the role of 
master. Our insane asylums are full of unfortunate 
people who have disregarded this injunction, and the 
profusion of "twilight" cases of persons possessing 
unbalanced mentalities with whom we often rub shoul- 
ders in the daily life also affords numerous instances 
of a similar disregard of this important rule of conduct. 



44 Psychical Surgery 

It will be remembered that extremely painful re- 
pressed memories manifest strong tendencies to become 
associated with other memories in the unconscious 
that are of a sympathetic character, and thus form 
constellations or "complexes," and it will be easy to 
apprehend that the bigger a memory constellation 
grows the greater will be the extent to which it can 
affect the conscious actions until, in extreme cases, the 
consciousness becomes eventually overpowered by the 
insistent activities of this unconscious mental "cancer," 
and a state of mental irresponsibility results. 

It will be seen that it is very vital to the personality 
that it apprehends the nature and extent of the uncon- 
scious complexes so that the conscious actions can be 
regulated accordingly, for it is by the nature and extent 
of these complexes that the characteristics of the per- 
sonality are determined and the conscious actions influ- 
enced. We are all just what we are, and do just what 
we do, by reason of the complexion of the unconscious 
mental life, and it is this unconscious mental life that, 
in reality, constitutes the personality; for the person- 
ality is the sum of the unconscious mentality. 

The whole experience of adult life consists in con- 
forming to the requirements of environment in a way 
that will conduce to the best interest of the race, and 
also in interlocking reactions between the conscious 
and the unconscious mental lives as a result of this 



The Unconscious Complexes 45 

environmental experience. These interlocking reac- 
tions between the consciousness and the unconscious 
consist of (a) repressions, (b) reactions (intuitive 
impulses), and (c) conflicts; and whether the per- 
sonality becomes a desirable socialized unit, and main- 
tains itself as such, or a psychical derelict, will depend 
upon the outcome of the conflicts between the conscious 
and unconscious elements of the mental mechanism. 

A desirable socialization of the personality entails 
the necessity of repressing all tendencies that would 
not comply with cultural requirements if permitted to 
become expressed. These repressing efforts com- 
mence with the dawn of individual responsibility, con- 
tinue practically to the grave, and result in the re- 
pressed memories becoming absorbed into the uncon- 
scious where all of them, the good and the bad, the 
strong and the weak, constitute the mechanism of the 
unconscious mental life, the influence of which upon 
the consciousness results in one long persistent conflict. 
The outcome of this conflict will decide whether the 
personality becomes and remains a well balanced and 
therefore valuable member of the social economy, or 
an ill balanced personality, and consequently one that 
may become a charge upon society instead of a sup- 
porter of it. 

All mental and emotional disturbances are the result 
of conflicts between undesirable unconscious complexes 



46 Psychical Surgery 

and a resisting consciousness, and a mental or nervous 
"breakdown" is nothing more or less than a breaking 
down of the defensive power of the consciousness 
against insistent impulses on the part of undesirable 
unconscious complexes. Of course, the individual who 
suffers from the breaking down of this defense will be 
totally unable to apprehend the real nature of the ail- 
ment that afflicts him, for he will always look for a 
conscious reason for a condition that is unconscious 
in character ; he may never even realize that any mental 
conflict has existed, and when the defense finally proves 
inadequate so that the consciousness becomes a prey 
to ungovernable emotional impulses the cause of the 
disaster may be attributed to "overwork," which is 
something that has never caused a "breakdown" in 
anyone. Then again if the conflict is purely mental, 
so that a breaking down of the defense results in some 
form of mental disturbance, the connection between 
cause and effect is even more incomprehensible to the 
sufferer's friends; in fact the cause of such affliction 
is often of such a wholly unaccountable nature to peo- 
ple not possessing psychiatrical knowledge that it is 
sometimes even attributed to some inscrutable divine 
reason, an explanation which is, of course, both stupid 

and blasphemous. 

From this brief outline of psychiatrical facts it 
should be realized that it is very vital that the individ- 



The: Unconscious Complexes 47 

ual should constantly apprehend the nature, extent and 
tendencies of his unconscious mental life, so that the 
necessary measures can be adopted by the conscious- 
ness to take advantage of the best that is available from 
the unconscious, and at the same time to neutralize 
the tendencies of impulses that menace the well being 
of the personality. 



48 Psychical Surgery 



THE NEUROSES 

The original research work that led to the develop- 
ment of the analytic method of psychical surgery was 
carried out in the course of a study of the neuroses by 
Dr. Josef Breuer, chief of the Clinic of Psychiatry, 
Zurich, in 1880-1882, and which study acted as a mag- 
net to the attention of a young medical student named 
Sigmund Freud, who was then working for his exam- 
inations ; and although the technique of psychoan- 
alysis has now become developed to such an extent 
that no one person can claim sole merit for its present 
status, Freud's name will ever bear the same relation 
to it as Lister's does to the governing principles of 
antiseptic surgery. But in Freud's case there was no 
sudden jump from obscurity to prominence, for the 
process of deciphering the hieroglyphics of the etio- 
logical scroll of the neuroses entailed many years of 
most painstaking labor, and even when the actual 
causes of the neuroses became so evident that they 
could not be gainsaid Freud encountered the bitterest 
hostility, for his discoveries entailed a revolution of 
previously entertained theories. But truth must always 
refuse to place sacrificial tributes on the altars of ignor- 
ance and superstition, and although Freud had to 



The Neuroses 49 

contend with much reactionary opposition on the part 
of even his own professional associates for a consider- 
able time, the truth of his contentions eventually be- 
came so obvious that they could no longer be denied. 

Stripped of all palliative phraseology, the cause of 
a neuroses is an abnormal condition in the sexual 
life of the patient arising from a repression of the 
sexual impulse unaccompanied by a corresponding 
/process of sublimation, and the best indication of the 
unerring truth of this diagnosis is the apparent absence 
of all sexual desire on the part of the sufferer. In 
other words : The total lack of any conscious sexual 
desire is a positive sign of the existence of an unde- 
sirable unconscious sexual life. 

Curiously enough Freud obtained his first clue to 
the etiology of the neuroses from three different 
sources, as Breuer of Zurich, Charcot of Paris and 
Chrobak of Vienna had each of them extended to 
Freud certain hints to some of the generalized opin- 
ions they held in this respect, but in relation to which 
opinions no research work had been carried out. For 
it required a young man of vigorous mentality and 
endowed with a rich faculty for visualizing a great 
possibility to follow up the clue that Breuer, Charcot 
and Chrobak had discerned, and one who was prepared 
to follow truth for truth's sake — irrespective of where 
the quest might lead. 



50 Psychical Surgery 

Even today the mental attitude that probably Breuer, 
Charcot and Chrobak shrewdly suspected would be 
manifested in relation to the sexual theory of the 
neuroses is still in evidence in many directions, so that 
some temporizing mortals (undoubtedly undesirably 
influenced by their own unconscious complexes), sub- 
scribe to Freud's general principles but with very 
definite reservations, and in applying what they profess 
to be the Freudian technique indulge in what is merely 
a substituted hodge-podge of their own creation. 

Under the analytical method every case of neurosis 
is found to lead back to a period in the mental and 
sexual life of the patient when very strong and unnat- 
ural repressions were indulged in, and which repres- 
sions resulted in a diverting of the energy of the sexual 
impulses from their natural inclinations to unnatural 
channels, so that this unused and un sublimated energy 
became an outlaw force which eventually produced a 
havoc of disturbance throughout the whole psychical 
mechanism. 

It is a common experience for people to practically 
starve to death with an abundance of enticing food 
available to the purse but lying beyond the price of 
hunger. There is no desire for food although the phy- 
sical mechanism so obviously stands in need of it ; and 
a neurosis is similarly a sign of starvation — sexual 
starvation, albeit not the slightest sign of sexual hunger 



The Neuroses 51 

is consciously apprehended. In fact sexual hunger is 
never consciously realized by the neurotic sufferer and 
all thoughts relating to the physical aspects of sexual 
indulgence are oftentimes repugnant ; nevertheless, as 
the reader will have come to realize by this time, 
when we want to understand the consciousness we 
must have recourse to an exploration of the uncon- 
scious. The conscious disturbance is merely an effect 
of undesirable unconscious conditions. 

It must be understood that the sexual impulse is * 
the primal race preservative energy, and can only be 
killed by killing the body ; in fact to kill the one means 
a killing of the other. This race preservative energy 
must either be utilized in a physical sense or else be 
absorbed by a desirable mental attitude, and a neurosis 
is a sure and certain sign that one or other or both of 
these requirements have been violated. 

The requirements of society entail upon the individ- 
ual a restraint upon the sexual impulses, and a sub- 
limation of them to meet the requirements of a higher 
order of things. Unfortunately, however, there is 
abundant evidence that mental and psychical develop- 
ment have not kept pace with the cultural demands 
in regard to the sexual relations. In other words : 
where social conditions impose a state of sexual con- 
tinence in the individual under certain conditions 
(and thereby deny a physical expression to the sexual 



52 Psychical Surgery 

impulse), it only too often transpires that the mental 
life of the individual has not been sufficiently trained 
to sublimate the energy that is represented in the pent 
up sexual desire. Under such conditions as these the 
only available defense that many individuals seem able 
to erect against the sensations of sexual hunger is that 
of denying the very existence of that hunger, e. g., by 
considering it sinful and wicked for any thoughts con- 
cerning the sexual life to be harbored in the conscious- 
ness for a moment. They therefore repress from the 
consciousness all thoughts concerning sexual matters 
as being sinful and zvicked, and thereby generate in 
the unconscious sexual complexes, which consist of 
constellations of memories and thoughts that revolve 
around a central sexual idea, and the emotional dis- 
turbance known as neurosis results from an uprush of 
this repressed unconscious force when its insistence 
succeeds in breaking down the defense that the con- 
sciousness has erected against it. 

The lesson that society has to learn in its own inter- 
est is, that cultural barriers to a primitive impulse 
must be created in the unconscious mental life if such 
barriers are to consist of anything more than mere 
conventional platitudes, for morality and immorality 
are unconscious attributes and not merely conscious 
mental attitudes. Therefore if a thought is "sinful" 
or "wicked" when in the consciousness it doesn't be- 



The Neuroses 53 

come pure and holy simply by being compelled to take 
up its abode in the unconscious, for such a process 
only succeeds in transforming a passing mental atti- 
tude into an intuitive impulse. 

Dr. Eduard Hitschmann of Vienna, one of the most 
responsible commentators on the Freudian theory of 
the neurosis, pointedly tells his medical brethren that a 
time has now arrived when truth and honesty demand 
recognition of the fact that the person who has broken 
down from "overwork" is not sick by reason of trying 
to perform duties that the average civilized brain is 
amply able to accomplish, but by reason of a gross 
abuse of the sexual life. In which connection, of 
course, the term abuse is used in a directly opposite 
sense from that in which it is commonly applied, and 
really means neglect: a neglect to recognize that the 
sexual impulse must find its expression in some way. 
If it is not used physically, it must be used in a subli- 
mated manner, and if it is neither used physically nor 
becomes sublimated it will eventually manage to secure 
an expression in the form of an emotional anarchy; 
for that is what a neurosis really is. 

The cause of the emotional anarchy being the exist- 
ence of undesirable unconscious conditions a cure for 
neurotic tendencies can only be hoped for through 
an adjustment of the unconscious complexes. Of 
course people are continually "breaking down" through 



54 Psychical Surgery 

neurotic conditions and "recovering" from them; but 
the point to remember is that the "breaking down" is a 
breaking down of a defense, hence a "recovery" is 
merely a success in re-establishing the defense for at 
least a temporary period ; the menace itself, however, 
still exists. It is the constitutional "weak spot" that 
sooner or later takes its toll. 



Psychoanalysis 55 



PSYCHOANALYSIS 

Psychoanalysis is a name coined by Freud to desig- 
nate the methods he originated and developed for 
determining and eradicating unconscious mental com- 
plexes, and to which the term psychical surgery is \l 
aptly applied. The term "psychoanalysis" has been 
and still is used by various people in connection with 
procedures that do not comply with the Freudian con- 
cept, and many of which methods not only form no 
legitimate part of, but are actually inconsistent with 
the Freudian technique. In this connection it may be 
stated that the farther one gets away from Freud's 
governing considerations in this great study the less 
competent one becomes to apprehend the vital char- 
acteristics of his great discoveries. 

The curing of undesirable unconscious mental condi- 
tions by psychoanalysis is effected by making syste- 
matic efforts to deliberately excite the complexes, by 
noting the nature of the reactions that are thus pro- 
duced, by tracing the line of connection that exists 
(in the form of associative memories) between the 
exciting agencies and the resultant reactions, and by 
these means making the unconscious memories con- 
scious. 



56 Psychical Surgery 

In order to deliberately excite the complexes a series 
of test words of from one to two hundred is prepared, 
the memory associations of which cover a very wide 
field. These words are known as stimulus words and 
are projected to the subject by the analyst with the 
understanding that the patient responds by uttering 
the first word or idea that comes into the mind — no 
matter what the word or idea may be. The word or 
idea expressed by the patient in response to the 
stimulus word of the analyst is known as the reaction. 
This reaction is noted down by the analyst, together 
with the reaction time, which is measured in fifths of 
a second ; and when the whole series of stimulus words 
has been gone through the list is repeated, and all vari- 
ances from the results of the. first test noted — if there 
are any; these variances are known as reproductions. 

The result of this initial test will probably develop 
instances of some or all of the following reactions : 

(a) The reaction associations may be unusual in 
character. 

(b) The reaction time may be unusually long. 

(c) A significant reaction may transmit a dis- 

turbance to succeeding reactions. (This is 
called perseveration) . 

(d) The reproduction reactions may show vari- 
ances from the original reaction. 

The following will serve to illustrate : 



Psychoanalysis 57 

If in response to the stimulus word tree the reaction 
response is, say, paper, it will be apparent that there is 
some association in the subject's mind between these 
two ideas of a somewhat unusual character. It does 
not necessarily follow, however, that an unusual asso- 
ciation is a significant one, for on analysis the connec- 
tion may prove to be quite ordinary and explainable; 
such an instance, however, would be a point for further 
attention on the part of the analyst. 

If it is found that the normal reaction time for a 
particular individual is, say, 2.3 seconds, and then a 
reaction time of 3.4, 4.1, or something even higher is 
experienced in some instances, all of such prolonged 
reactions are significant. Then) if in the reproduction 
test the reaction word is a different one to that which 
was noted in the original test, or if there are any per- 
severations (note explanation at "c"), such phenomena 
are always significant and are known as complex 
indicators. 

The next stage of the technique may consist in util- 
izing what is known as the free association of ideas in 
relation to those stimulus words to which there were 
significant reactions — which principle of free associ- 
ation must be fully apprehended by the subject. 

When we are thinking intellectually we are concen- 
trating the voluntary attention on some subject, and 
actively criticizing, analyzing, estimating, co-ordinating, 



58 Psychical Surgery 

and otherwise sitting in judgment upon the nature and 
value of the thoughts that come up into the conscious- 
ness ; but in permitting a flow of free associations there 
must be no criticism or analysis on the patient's part 
whatever, and a positively free expression must be 
given to the analyst of every thought that comes up 
into the consciousness as it occurs. There must be no 
reservations whatever. 

Every thought that comes into the consciousness has 
a memory history to which, naturally, it is connected; 
and whenever a thought comes into the consciousness 
it is because it has some memory association with the 
stimulating agency, no matter how apparently incon- 
gruous this association may appear. What the analyst 
aims at is therefore to take those words or ideas in 
connection with which there were significant reactions, 
project them to the subject (i. e., recall them to him), 
and enjoin him to speak freely whatever comes up into 
the consciousness in response to these ideas, to refrain 
from any criticizing, to let the mind drift along where- 
ever it chooses, and to frankly describe to the analyst 
every aspect of such mental panorama. 

The scenes that form in the consciousness as a reac- 
tion to some stimulus idea constitute part of the actual 
memory history of the idea that is suggested. They 
constitute the roots that lead down into the mental 
storehouse from which the intellectual concept in rela- 



Psychoanalysis 59 

tion to the idea has been derived; and if the subject 
will refrain from exercising any criticism and simply 
act the part of a spectator as it were, then every suc- 
ceeding memory scene that comes into the conscious- 
ness does so by reason of some memory association 
with the preceding one. In other words, one scene 
leads to another by reason of sympathetic associations ; 
and all such scenes are the visualized memory roots 
of the idea that was held in the consciousness in the 
first place. An illustration may serve to make this 
quite clear: 

If the mind is directed towards some idea there be- 
comes formed in the consciousness a pictorial scene 
in which the original idea will form an essential part. 
Thus, if the idea of cat is suggested, with the under- 
standing that the consciousness is to hold that idea 
until it is involuntarily superceded by some other idea, 
a scene will be formed in the mind in which a cat, and 
probably some particular one, will be a feature; and 
every element of the scene in question, no matter 
whether it is a landscape, an article of clothing, or any 
other conceivable object, will have some memory asso- 
ciation with the stimulus idea — cat. 

If the processes of free association are permitted to 
act entirely without restraint it will not be long before 
scenes will be coming up into the consciousness which 
the subject would not consider had any direct relation 



60 Psychical Surgery 

to the original idea; the mind will have apparently 
wandered far away from the original idea. But if the 
associations have been free, no matter how far removed 
the last scene may appear to be from the original one, 
there is always a connection between them, even if it 
is not consciously remembered. 

The great necessity for the subject to wholly refrain 
from any criticism as to the relevancy or importance 
of any idea that may come into the mind should now 
be apparent. The object of the analyst is to stimulate 
and maintain a floiv of intuitive memory associations, 
hence there must be an entire withholding of any intel- 
lectual control or judgment on the patient's part. 

It will be realized that an unreserved expression on 
the part of the subject of the unrestricted and uncon- 
trolled flow of thoughts that come up into the con- 
sciousness will entail a not inconsiderable sacrifice of 
personal feelings, for the analyst cannot proceed very 
far with his work before the curtains of the soul will 
of necessity have to be drawn wide apart, and of course 
the question as to whether the personality shall un- 
dergo a passing pain or endure a life-time agony is 
one for the patient to personally decide. The memory 
roots of an idea, however, know no ethical or moral 
frontiers, and psychical surgery entails quite a little 
temporary conscious pain ; but it cures. 

The greatest obstacle that the analyst has to over- 



Psychoanalysis 61 

come is not the conscious resistence resulting from a 
shrinking on the part of the patient from giving free 
and unrestricted expression to ideas and thoughts that 
are painful, but the unconscious resistence. For the 
uncovering of an unconscious complex entails an over- 
coming of conditions that the complex is always 
endeavoring intuitively to create; but if painstaking 
efforts are made to follow the technical measures that 
are available in this respect it may be said that, in the 
case of fairly good subjects, the ultimate discovery of 
the undesirable underlying complex can always be 
accomplished. 

When the processes of free association are invoked 
in relation to the ideas to which there were significant 
reactions in the first series of test words, the analyst 
will begin to have access to the memory roots of the 
ideas to which these reactions are related, and in course 
of time will probably reach a point where an uncon- 
scious resistence is encountered. During this flow of 
memory associations, however, the analyst will have 
formed some very definite conclusions of his own, and 
will prepare and project a second series of test words, 
in which there will be interposed words that the 
analyst suspects may invite some significant reactions, 
and which are known as critical words; and while using 
these w T ords he will, as in the case of the previous 
set (and all subsequent sets of words if such be event- 



62 Psychical Surgery 

ually used), carefully tabulate the resulting reactions 
as to (a) their nature, (b) time of reactions, (c) 
reproduction variation, and (d) general disturbances. 
The significant reactions in this second test will be 
utilized as stimulus agencies for inviting a fresh series 
of flows of free associations, by means of which the 
ideas connected with all of the significant reactions 
can be traced to their memory; roots as in the previous 
instance ; and thus on until a further unconscious resist- 
ance may possibly be encountered. In this latter event 
the analyst will construct another set of test words, 
interspersed with which will be further critical words 
of such a nature that the analyst may consider calcu- 
lated to invite further significant reactions, and then 
proceed to stimulate further flows of free associations. 

It will be seen that it will be only a question of 
time, and of resourcefulness on the part of the prac- 
titioner, before the enveloping process of the analysis 
will succeed in attaining its object ; for the net will have 
become spread so wide, and the mesh of the net will 
be so fine, that only such unpropitious conditions as a 
too advanced age of the subject, or some undesirable 
characteristics in connection with his mental attitude, 
can prevent eventual success. 

As the analysis proceeds the memory roots of con- 
scious ideas become traced deeper and deeper down 
to their unconscious sources, until in course of time 



Psychoanalysis 63 

the whole range of memories relating to the undesir- 
able complexes are made available to the consciousness. 
By this means the connection between the undesirable 
tendencies of the adult life and the infantile concept 
memories from which they have been derived can be 
linked up, and the patient is enabled to peer into the 
very recesses of his own soul and thereby, for the first 
time, come face to face with his true self. 

A little reflection on the reader's part will now 
enable him to understand why a cure of a mental or 
emotional disturbance is effected simply by making 
the unconscious causes of the ailment recognizable by 
the consciousness. It will be remembered that the 
nature of the mental or emotional ailment is in the form 
of a disturbance of the conscious mental life by an 
unconscious influence, which influence can only exist 
by reason of its dissociation from conscious recogni- 
tion. The analytical method of psychotherapeutics 
therefore consists in systematically exploring the un- 
conscious, recovering therefrom the repressed undesir- 
able dissociated memories, bringing them up again into 
the consciousness, and (by resynthesizing them into 
the conscious mental life) destroying the impulses 
generated by these memories. 

In the case of an infantile fixation, for example, the 
memories of an experience that seemed crushing to 
the infantile mind will appear trivial when brought up 



64 Psychical Surgery 

into the adult consciousness, for the adult mind will 
have an opportunity of placing an adult appraisment 
upon a juvenile concept and thereby become released 
from its juvenile anchorage. The personality therefore 
becomes "stepped up" in relation to whatever temper- 
amental feature had been restrained from proper devel- 
opment. 

In the case of repressions that have occurred during 
adult life, the undesirable thoughts and memories that 
have been transformed from being unpleasant conscious 
elements into positively harmful unconscious influ- 
ences, are again brought back to the plane of conscious- 
ness and frankly faced, with the result that the unde- 
sirable impulses are divested of their power, for they 
have become again transformed from being intuitive 
impulses into mere unpleasant thoughts, which un- 
pleasant thoughts will soon lose any sting that might 
still be clinging to them by reason of the capacity of a 
readjusted personality to view things from a higher 
and more commanding mental attitude ; for the con- 
sciousness will have become unburdened of the "drag" 
of its unconscious conflicts and will be thus enabled 
to bring a whole self to meet the responsibilities of the 
daily life instead of a self that had hitherto been 
divided against itself. 



Complexes and Dream Phenomena 65 



COMPLEXES AND DREAM 
PHENOMENA 

Fieud's analysis of the unconscious mental life of 
his patients soon brought him into contact with their 
dream experiences, and by utilizing his analytical 
methods he demonstrated that dreams are never mean- 
ingless jumbles of casual ideas mentally pictorialized 
but are always indicative of underlying unconscious 
mental conditions. The analysis of dreams eventually 
constituted one of Freud's most important methods for 
uncovering the unconscious mental life of his patients 
and is described by him in The Interpretation of 
Dreams as "the Via Regia to an understanding of the 
unconscious mental life." 

The technique of dream analysis consists in resolving 
the dream into its elemental parts, and then utilizing 
the ideas or thoughts that those elemental parts consist 
of as stimulus agencies for inviting flows of free asso- 
ciations. 

The elements of a dream are always orderly per se, 
and any seeming disorderliness in the visualized ideas 
of which the dream is composed is not a disorderliness 
of the dream elements themselves but of the manner in 
which they are grouped together; for that matter no 



66 Psychical Surgery 

element of anything can be otherwise than orderly, for 
it is necessarily something that is complete in itself. 

Dream phenomena are based upon the ever present 
tendency of repressed thoughts (wishes that the con- 
sciousness desires to disavow) to secure an expression 
in the consciousness when there is a relaxation of the 
cultural censoring qualities, and which relaxation is 
most pronounced in that twilight state of consciousness 
which immediately precedes the awakening from actual 
sleep. The seeming disorderliness of the dream, 
•manifested in the form of distortion and disguise, is a 
compromise between the censoring tendencies of the 
consciousness and the underlying dream thoughts, and 
is an expression by indirect means of thoughts that 
would not be tolerated by the consciousness if ex- 
pressed in a direct manner. It is a putting into the 
form of a symbolical picture thoughts and wishes that 
the cultural consciousness desires to deny the exist- 
ence of. 

As the thoughts that constitute the foundations of 
the dream have been repressed by a conscious censor- 
ship at some time or other, this same censoring influ- 
ence (in the form of a conscious defense), has to be 
overcome by the repressed thoughts in order to again 
receive conscious recognition ; and as the twilight stage 
of consciousness (which immediately precedes awaken- 
ing from actual sleep), is a period when the cultural 



Complexes and Dream Phenomena 67 

censorship of the consciousness is naturally in a similar 
' 'twilight stage" of assertiveness, the conditions are 
most propitious for a certain degree of escape of re- 
pressed thoughts, which escape takes form in the con- 
sciousness as a dream picture. By reason of the exist- 
ence of some extent of wakefulness on the part of the 
cultural censorship, however, the thoughts that suc- 
ceed in escaping temporarily from the unconscious are 
subjected to so much resistence by the censorship that 
they become disordered in their grouping; the dream 
thoughis only escape in a disguised form. 

The two chief factors in dream disguise are conden- 
sation and displacement. Condensation is caused by 
various unconscious ideas becoming condensed into one 
picture fragment, such as a composite person-figure 
where the height of one person, a feature of clothing 
of another, or a mannerism of another, etc., become 
blended into one seeming individual, or where the 
whole or a part of some object, person, form or scene 
constitutes a seeming part or parts of some other 
object, person, form or scene, etc., the endless possible 
varieties of such combinations being of course obvious. 

In displacement the dream thoughts that are actually 
of the greatest significance appear in the dream picture 
in the least significant manner and vice versa; hence 
those elements in a dream picture that are the most 
strongly defined may represent the least significant of 



68 Ps^hicai. Surgery 

the underlying dream thoughts; while the hazy part, 
the part that seems to fade away the most quickly 
when the sleeper awakens, is oftentimes the vital ele- 
ment around which an unconscious conflict revolves 
with the greatest insistence. That which we remember 
is often important, but that which is indistinct and is 
so readily forgotten is vital. 

It is by reason of the almost infinite possibilities in 
the grouping of dream thoughts through condensation 
and displacement that the dream picture appears to be 
•so wholly incomprehensible until the exact conditions 
are revealed by analysis ; but a dream is always signifi- 
cant, even to the most seemingly trivial elements, and 
if on analysis some particular element has no great 
significance per se it will always be found to be closely 
associated with some element that has. In dream phe- 
nomena contradictions are only apparently such, and 
what at first may appear trivial becomes very important 
when its value is rightly appraised. 

In dream scenes the tendencies and wishes of the 
unconscious thoughts find an expression, the degree of 
which expression, together with the directness or indi- 
rectness that it takes, depends wholly upon the cultural 
resistance that has to be overcome by the undesirable 
dream thoughts; and lest any self righteous person 
should unctiously assume an attitude of excessive holi- 
ness based upon the fact that he is not a prolific 



Complexes and Dream Phenomena 69 

dreamer it must be understood that, just because 
dreams reveal the existence of undesirable unconscious 
conditions the lack of dreams by no means gives any 
license for assuming that the unconscious conditions 
are any the more desirable. The lack of dreams only 
indicates that the period of transition from lethargic 
sleep to complete consciousness is very rapid, and in 
such cases the twilight interval is either eliminated or 
extremely abbreviated. Unconscious thoughts are 
therefore not necessarily any the better by reason of 
their not being revealed by dream phenomena, in which 
connection Freud says that "The mark of the beast is to 
be found in all dreams," which remark Ferenczi ampli- 
fies by saying: "There is not a single dream that 
cannot be shown by analysis to offend against some 
legal or ethical canon." The dreams of small children 
are, of course, excepted, and the dreams of small chil- 
dren are the only ones in which there is no disguise, 
simply because there is nothing to be disguised. 

A dream is always excited by something that has 
been experienced on the preceding day, the nature of 
which exciting influence, however, will not be appre- 
hended until revealed by analysis, for the principles 
involved are exactly similar to those which exist when 
a complex is aroused during the waking state, i. e., 
there is no conscious recognition between the experi- 
ence and the unconscious reaction. An experience 



70 Psychical Surgery 

having been undergone (in the form of something 
seen, heard or thought of), by which repressed uncon- 
scious memories are stimulated into activity, these 
memories acquire a conscious expression at the first 
opportunity; this opportunity is the twilight stage of 
consciousness that is probably experienced towards 
the morning of the night after the day that the stimu- 
lating experience occurred. 

The procedure of analyzing dreams is to divide the 
dream into its elemental parts, then to take these 
parts, in turn, and utilize them as stimulus ideas for 
generating flows of free associations. These flows of 
free associations will be found to lead down into the 
unconscious to the actual dream thoughts, the nature of 
which will constitute the true meaning of the dream 
picture. In following these flows of free associations 
from the conscious dream picture to the unconscious 
dream thoughts we retrace downwards the more or less 
exact course by which the dream thoughts came up into 
the consciousness from the unconscious. The free asso- 
ciation of ideas constitutes the tell-tale trail of the 
escaped undesirable unconscious wishes. 

The main principles of dream phenomena may be 
thus summarized: 

(a) A dream always expresses the fulfillment of a 
wish, (b) The unconscious thoughts expressed in the 
dream are of great significance to the personality, (c) 



Complexes and Dream Phenomena 71 

The dream is disguised in direct ratio to the cultural 
requirements that would be violated if the expression 
were undisguised, (d) The dream is always excited 
by some experience of the preceding day. (e) The 
elements of the dream picture can be traced to the 
underlying dream thoughts by the technique of con- 
forming to the requirement of maintaining flows of free 
association of ideas, (f) The dream thoughts, , natur- 
ally, constitute the true meaning of the dream picture. 

It is by means of the disguise presented by the dream 
picture that the underlying undesirable thoughts suc- 
ceed in finding expression, and in a way that is often 
particularly seductive to the consciousness ; so seduc- 
tive, in fact, that it is a common experience for a 
person to narrate a dream as a humorous experience, 
and to be totally unaware that by so doing he is throw- 
ing wide open the doors of his soul so that any passing 
wayfarer who may possess psychoanalytical knowledge 
can discern what lies therein. 

We dream only of things that we would like to 
forget or that we wish had never happened, and thus 
it is that we have so few dreams in relation to pleasant 
experiences of the past or of departed loved ones. We 
do not dream of things that we consciously like or of 
people whom we consciously love, for there are no 
repressions of thoughts in connection with things we 
like or of people we love; on the contrary we like to 



72 Psychical Surgery 

keep the memories of pleasant experiences and of loved 
associations forever green in our consciousness, and 
to live them over and over again in our waking life, 
for we never tire of feasting on such remembrances. 
But it is from the things that we dislike and the memo- 
ries that are painful that we desire to be consciously 
dissociated, and which we wish to force out from our 
consciousness with as much violence as possible ; hence 
it is from these sources of repressed painful memories 
that our dreams are produced. It may be that we will 
tlream of a departed loved one upon occasion, the 
experience of which may at first glance seem impos- 
sible to associate with any undesirable memory, but 
under the acid test of the analytical method it always 
transpires that the seemingly pleasant dream picture is 
only a ghastly camouflaging disguise behind which 
lurk painful memories of some action of ours that we 
not only wish had never happened but the very exist- 
ence of which we have strived to consciously deny. 

The dream experiences of a person indicate more 
directly and positively than any other index, the exact 
character of the unconscious mental life, and one of the 
most interesting phenomenon in connection with the 
practice of psychoanalysis is the progressive improve- 
ment effected in the unconscious mental life by the 
analytical method as revealed in the changed character 
of the dream experiences. As the analysis progresses 



Complexes and Dream Phenomena 73 

the dreams become fewer in number, and the disguise 
less complicated until, in ideal cases, the camounaging 
factor disappears altogether, so that whatever dreams 
occur are again as open and guileless as was the case 
in the infant life ; the unconscious mind, the soul of 
the personality, has become cleansed of its psychical 
undesirabilities. 



74 Psychical Surgery 



CONCLUSION 

Every form of physical substance is composed of ele- 
ments that are indestructable, though the manner in 
which elements are grouped together can be altered 
and a new form of substance thereby created; in the 
mental world similar principles prevail. The memories 
of all of the experiences that the individual has under- 
gone constitute the elements that decide the character 
of the mental attitude, and memory-elements are as 
indestructable as physical elements are. But memory- 
elements can be regrouped just as physical elements 
can, and by this means a new "substance" can be cre- 
ated in the form of a readjusted mental attitude. This 
is what the analytical method of psycho-therapeutics 
accomplishes ; old and undesirable memory groupings 
are dissolved and new and more desirable groups cre- 
ated, and a re-adjustment of the conscious mental 
attitude thereby effected. 

It is very necessary that a new conception in rela- 
tion to the treatment of undesirable memories becomes 
developed in the popular mind and the harmful effects 
of certain old ideas thereby avoided. Instead of trying 
to forget painful memories (which means an attempt 
to believe that the painful experiences have never 



Conclusion 75 

occurred), there should be adopted the sound psychi- 
atrical doctrine of dispersing them; not to attempt the 
impossible task of making such memories extinct but 
to neutralize their undesirable tendencies by re-group- 
ing them in association with other dominating memo- 
ries of a desirable character. By these means instead 
of a conscious pain becoming transformed into an un- 
conscious disease, the undesirable memory-elements 
that are dominating the mental attitude are rendered 
innocuous. The object aimed at, therefore, in psy- 
choanalysis is not forgetfulness (which is impossible) 
but dispersion. It is the impossibility of conforming 
to the former idea that has resulted in wrecking so 
many otherwise promising lives, and it is the sound 
psychiatrical principle of the latter concept whereby 
hope is extended to and cures effected in many cases 
of mental and psychical disturbances that would other- 
wise be practically hopeless. 

Psychoanalysis is not a philosophy to be preached, 
but a scientific technique whereby help can be given 
to those who, by reason of the nature of their afflic- 
tions, are unable to help themselves, and to whom 
sermons and lectures would only be mockeries. Of 
course the analytical method is a form of psychical 
surgery that inflicts upon the patient a certain degree 
of passing mental pain, but the very decision to under- 
go this passing discomfort is in itself sufficient evidence 



76 Psychical Surgery 

of an underlying intensity of desire to reach to a higher 
level of mental and psychical completeness. 

In concluding this little book I will take the liberty 
of quoting the following from Albert Mordell's The 
Erotic Motive in Literature : 

"Ghosts of sorrows and grief that we have thought 
laid away still revisit us in our waking hours. They 
stalk before us and open up old wounds, and we learn 
that these are not yet healed. They awaken agonies 
that again smite us; they make us harken back again 
to* unkind words dealt us, to suffering inflicted, to injus- 
tice done. Shocks which time had made obtuse are 
revived; we reap the harvest of anxieties garnered in 
our hearts ; and we discover that the old despair has not 
altogether vanished but still occasionally gnaws us. 

"The dead rules the living; forgotten incidents, soul 
wrecking mistakes, chance misfortune still dominate us 
* * * It is life's grimmest tragedy that we carry within 
us ghosts of our old days — ghosts which take us by 
surprise by their vigor. They mock us at their will; 
we are tormented unawares; they take the savor out 
of our food; they dangle at our footsteps when we go 
to the house of mirth ; they trail us in ghastly pursuit 
long after we have emerged from the house of mourn- 
ing." 

It is in relation to the "laying the ghosts" of the 
past that the technique of psychoanalysis can be hope- 



Conclusion 77 

fully applied ; ghosts of past memories that are forever 
rising up from out of the unconscious mind to bind 
and fetter both conscious actions and mental attitudes ; 
memories that (in tragic error) have been considered 
dead, but which in reality have only been dissociated 
from conscious recognition and control. 



The following are most of the important works on 
psychoanalysis that are as yet available in English: 

The Psychoanalytic Method.... Dr. Oskar Pfister 

Psychoanalysis, Its Theory and Application Dr. A. A. Brill 

The Technique of Psychoanalysis Dr. Smith Ely Jelliffe 

Papers on Psychoanalysis Dr. Ernest Jones 

Contributions to Psychoanalysis Dr. S. Ferenzci 

History and Practice of Psychoanalysis Dr. Poul Bjerre 

History of the Psychoanalytical Movement 

~ Dr. Sigmund Freud 

The Interpretation of Dreams Dr. Sigmund Freud 

Th*e Psycho pathology of Everyday Life Dr. Sigmund Freud 

Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex 

Dr. Sigmund Freud 

Selected Papers on Hysteria Dr. Sigmund Freud 

Freud's Theory of the Neuroses Dr. E. Hitchman 

The Dream Problem _ Dr. A. E. Maeder 

Psychology of the Unconscious Dr. C. G. Jung 

Analytical Psychology Dr. C. G. Jung 

Outlines of Psychiatry Dr. William A. White 

Human Motives Dr. James Jackson Putnam 

Man's Unconscious Conflict Dr. Wilfred Lay (Ph.D.) 

The Child's Unconscious Mind Dr. Wilfred Lay (Ph.D.) 

The Mental Hygiene of Childhood Dr. William A. White 

Mechanics of Character Formation.... Dr. William A. White 

A Study of the Mental Life of the Child _ 

..Dr. H. Von Hug-Hellmuth 

The Erotic Motive in Literature « Albert Mordell 

The Significance of Psychoanalysis for the Mental 

Sciences Dr. Otto Rank and Dr. Hanns Sachs 



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